Yesterday the Hedgeye Macro Team, led by CEO Keith McCullough, hosted its quarterly Macro Themes conference call in which it detailed the THREE MOST IMPORTANT MACRO TRENDS it has identified for 1Q16 and the associated investment implications.

We encourage you to check out the Video Replay (below); the Audio Replay and Presentation Materials can be accessed via the links underneath.

For the audio replay CLICK HERE 

To access the presentation materials CLICK HERE

Q1 2016 MACRO THEMES OVERVIEW:

  • U.S. #Recession?: Industrial activity and corporate profitability are already trending at recessionary levels. Meanwhile, domestic employment, consumption and income growth are all past peak and policy-driven deflationary pressures should persist in perpetuating soft external demand, EM distress, weak import pricing, HY credit risk and further flagging in corporate capex. We’ll contextualize the current macro data and handicap the probability of recession as the late-cycle U.S. economy traverses its steepest GDP base effects of the cycle.
  • #CreditCycle: An extended breakout in corporate credit spreads has preceded recessionary periods in prior cycles, and since we introduced our deflation theme in 2H14, both high yield and investment grade spreads have marched higher off all-time lows in cross-asset volatility and all-time highs in corporate credit outstanding. In effect, we are loudly reiterating our call that the unwind of ZIRP and QE will continue to deflate the easy money credit boom it fabricated in the form of continued recessionary earnings growth as the business cycle gets dangerously long in the tooth.
  • #CurrencyWar: Historically, Fed tightening cycles, #LateCycle slowdowns and #Quad3 outcomes have all been independently been bearish for the USD. As such, our expectation for a continuation of #StrongDollar commodity and asset price deflation appears misguided in the context of our dour fundamental outlook for the U.S. economy. That said, however, currencies cannot be analyzed in isolation and our proprietary analysis of the world’s top-10 economies renders the [dollar-bullish] global monetary policy divergence theme we authored well intact. 

-The Hedgeye Macro Team